DETROIT -- It's now heart-wrenching to listen to but absolutely necessary. It tells his story.

It’s the audio of an old interview with Brad McCrimmon, saved to the desktop of my laptop for more than three years and never deleted. It never will be.

In 2008, we sat down after an Atlanta Thrashers practice at a restaurant called the Breakaway Grill overlooking the team’s practice ice in Duluth, Ga.

McCrimmon was the favorite to be named the Thrashers’ next coach, an offer he eventually turned down when the organization wouldn’t guarantee enough of his salary. That’s just how he was, a man who stood firm in his beliefs.

That afternoon, I told him I was writing his life story for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

“(Expletive), that won’t take long,” he shot back.

On Wednesday came the unfathomable news that his life story was cut short, the ending nothing like it was supposed to be.

McCrimmon was the first-year coach of the KHL’s Yaroslavl Lokomotiv, the hockey team devastated in Wednesday’s plane crash. The KHL confirmed that McCrimmon was one of the casualties, along with at least 42 other people.

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Joe Louis Arena, where McCrimmon last coached in the NHL as a Detroit Red Wings assistant under Mike Babcock for the previous three seasons, was somber on Wednesday. It’s also the building where McCrimmon helped break in a young Nicklas Lidstrom. McCrimmon was the first regular NHL defensive partner for the future Hall of Famer. In all, McCrimmon played in 1,222 NHL games as a physical stay-at-home defenseman, finishing an astonishing plus-444.

“He was my partner every game my first year,” Lidstrom said on Wednesday. “He was that steady defenseman who stayed home all the time. He protected me in certain situations too when things got a little too heated. He was a great partner to have.”

It wasn’t just Lidstrom. McCrimmon partnered with a young Chris Pronger during Pronger’s first season with the Hartford Whalers and also helped break in a young Gary Suter with the Calgary Flames. NHL coaches tended to pair McCrimmon with their young defensemen because they knew he’d take care of them.

He was coaching long before he ever got the title.

So I played the audio of McCrimmon sharing his coaching philosophy, one he was testing in Russia.

“Coaching is about a belief system,” McCrimmon said that afternoon in Georgia. “My belief system was instilled in me when I was about four or five years old. My belief system hasn’t changed a whole lot. My belief in what makes players and teams hasn’t really changed a whole lot. Those are just facts of life.”

He formed that system growing up and working on a Saskatchewan grain and beef farm. His father Byron played for the Saskatoon Quakers and shaped McCrimmon into the man and hockey player we all got to know and respect.

“I played with some great leaders. But the first great leader I had was my dad,” McCrimmon said.

From his dad, McCrimmon learned that you didn’t just speak of hard work. You did it. You didn’t just delegate the worst jobs on the farm to the youngest kids. You jumped in there with them.

“True leadership is when you ask of other people to do a job, you don’t blink an eye – you’re in the same job,” McCrimmon said. “That’s leadership. That’s what teams are built on.”

That’s why when news surfaced that the plane carrying McCrimmon’s team crashed, the devastating reality that he was in trouble immediately hit. That’s why the Wednesday morning text sent to his cell phone asking for any confirmation of his safety was accompanied by tears.

It was impossible to imagine McCrimmon anywhere else than with his team. The silence confirmed it.

To those in hockey, he was known simply as "Beast." Watch a few clips of his playing days on YouTube and it’s easy to see why the nickname fit so perfectly. He liked to joke that he wasn’t just satisfied getting an opposing player in a choke hold in the corners of the rink; he wanted to see their eyes bulge. That was Beast.

But the nickname didn’t originate from anything done on the ice. He said it came from the daughter of former teammate Peter McNab during McCrimmon’s rookie season with the Boston Bruins. She thought he resembled a children’s character named Beast and the nickname stuck.

McCrimmon connected with everyone -- children, teammates, fans, media. He was an incredible father to his two children and was loved by those he played with -- and those who played for him. He was ready to take on his latest challenge in life, and it was easy to see it resulting in a future offer for an NHL job. Mostly because he didn’t just talk of things he learned on the farm -- trust, respect, discipline, accountability and sacrifice. He lived it. Just not nearly long enough.